A Hero Perished: The Diary and Selected Letters of Nile Kinnick - Softcover

Nile C Kinnick (author)|Paul Baender (author)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 087745390X ISBN 13: 9780877453901

Publisher: University of Iowa Press, 1992

Synopsis

A Hero Perished tells Nile Kinnick's story. This grandson of an Iowa governor, the son of parents who disciplined him to strive for his measure of greatness, became a Heisman Trophy winner and national celebrity through a combination of talent and circumstance. Following his college successes, Kinnick began legal study to prepare for a political career, but with the approach of war he entered the Navy Air Corps to refashion himself as a fighter pilot. Assigned to the carrier USS Lexington on its premier cruise, he took off in a defective plane--and his death shocked a nation grown almost used to tragic loss.

For the first time, Kinnick tells his own tale through his engaging letters--all but one previously unpublished--and his diary, printed in its entirety for the first time. The result is a human, intimate look at the true person behind the myth, revealing both his foibles and his essential principles. A Hero Perished also includes a definitive text of Kinnick's moving Heisman Award acceptance speech and his impassioned commencement supper address, calling on the new Iowa graduates to achieve moral courage in a time of depression and war.

An illuminating comment on a time and attitude that have passed, A Hero Perished is of and about a football player, but it is not a football book--it is far more. This volume displays Kinnick--who was, despite his great gifts and achievements, a vulnerable and decent young man--in a time of great change and peril when a phase of our culture was passing away.

About this title

Review

"A warm, intimate look at a genuine American hero, who won the Heisman Trophy in 1939 and then perished aboard a Navy fighter plane. Must reading for every college student and their parents."--New York Times

"Proves the Kinnick legend had a solid foundation in truth--altogether the book also portrays someone who didn't feel entirely grown up and was unsure about what he wanted to do with his life."--Des Moines Register

"Seen here are glimpses of the life of a Heisman Trophy winner (1939), politically sensitive celebrity, and budding naval flier...Baender has done an excellent editing job, providing context and notes to provide a human portrait of this scion of prominent Iowa families."--Library Journal

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Iowa Press
• Publication date: 1992
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 087745390X
• ISBN 13: 9780877453901
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 290